Category Archives: Communicating migration seminar series 2014

Communicating Migration Seminar Series IMER Bergen spring and autumn 2014
The IMER seminar series for 2014 will cover how migration and ethnic relations are communicated in every-day encounters, in mass and social media, in politics and in teaching at the universities. Has the way people talk about migration and migrants in different social contexts changed over time, and in which ways has it changed? How does migration theory and research fit in with other topics and theories in the social sciences, and how do results from migration research inform public debate and policy development? Communicating migration will be discussed from various angles in our seminar series on international migration and ethnic relations during spring and autumn 2014. We welcome papers that touch upon this broad theme from different angles. Historical analyses of change over time in regard to politics and public debate, research foci and disciplinary concerns are specifically welcomed. The seminar series will end with a two-day conference in October/November 2014.

Communicating migration closing conference

The conference is open: No registration

The IMER seminar series for 2014 have covered how migration and ethnic relations are communicated in every-day encounters, in mass and social media, in art, in politics and in research and teaching at the universities. Has the way people talk about migration and migrants in different social contexts changed over time, and in which ways has it changed?

How does migration theory and research relate to other topics and theories in the social sciences, and how do results from migration research inform public debate and policy development? What are the challenges we encounter in communicating migration? Continue reading →

COMMUNICATING MIGRATION SEMINARS: ESPEN HELGESEN – “Your dad is looking for you” – Children’s perspectives on state intervention in immigrant families in Norway

Monday 16th of June at 14.15 – 16.00 – UNI Rokkansenteret, Nygårdsgaten 5. Bergen, 6 etg.

Several recent international news stories have described state-initiated forced separation of children and parents in Norway, illustrating how local decisions in the Child Welfare Service can have widespread ramifications outside the families involved. In this paper I draw on ethnographic fieldwork among immigrant families in Kristiansand, Norway, to show how a group of children responded when one of their friends suddenly disappeared. The secrecy surrounding the inner workings of the Child Welfare Service led the children to frame the incident as a “kidnapping”, and several children expressed fear that they, Continue reading →

COMMUNICATING MIGRATION SEMINARS: CHRISTHARD HOFFMANN – Lessons from the past: framing post-war immigration in Germany by historical analogies

Lessons from the past: framing post-war immigration in Germany by historical analogies

June 2, 2014 @ 2:15 pm – 4:00 pm UNI Rokkansenteret Nygårdsgaten 5, 6 etg

In many West European countries, the experience of mass immigration after 1945 was perceived as something basically new and unprecedented. In the lengthy process of coming to terms with the new situation and of developing a self-understanding as countries of immigration and of ethnic pluralism, historical arguments often played an important role. By placing present-day immigration into a historical perspective, by constructing narratives of continuity (and discontinuity) and not least by presenting persuasive historical analogies, Continue reading →

COMMUNICATING MIGRATION SEMINAR SERIES: Hans Lucht – The station hustle

Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Niger, this Hans Lucht discusses how stranded migrants have become facilitators of the very journey they have failed to make themselves. These connection men, or ‘pushers’ as they say themselves, are now key actors in high-risk migration across the Sahara Desert via Libya to Europe. They have somehow turned all their misfortunes into a form of capital, while awaiting a new chance to go to Europe. Continue reading →

Communicating migration seminar: Caroline Knowles – The Children of the Revolution: Reflections on Chinese London and how to Theorise these New Forms of Migration

The Children of the Revolution: Reflections on Chinese London and how to Theorise these New Forms of Migration

This paper explores some of the London data from a three-city investigation of migration. The other two cities are Beijing and Hong Kong, and in each city we are exploring young (23-39) graduate migrants from the other two cities in order to understand how global mobility features in young professionals’ life and career planning. Little has been written about UK migrants in Hong Kong and Beijing, and the existing literature on Chinese migrants in London is centred on long-term (often depicted as poor and illegal) migrants from Hong Kong. Such studies do not Continue reading →

Communicating Migration Seminar: Lise W. Isaksen -Mobility, moral and migration: “Familism” in Norwegian and Italian Contexts”

«Mobilitet, moral og migrasjon: familisme – begrepet i norske og italienske kontekster.»

Seminaret tar for seg hvordan middelhavslandenes familisme – begrep konstrueres og erfares i migrasjons-kontekster blant nordmenn i Italia og italienere i Norge. Dagens familisme utfordres både av «post-moderne” endringer i familie-strukturen, slik som lav fertilitet og stigende skilsmisse-rater, og av finanskrise og migrasjon.I Sør-Europa eksisterer lav fertilitet side om side med tradisjonelle omsorgs-organiseringer og parallelt med kontant-tunge velferdsprogrammer og begrenset produksjon av tjenester for de unge og de eldre. Continue reading →

FIRST COMMUNICATING MIGRATION SEMINAR

Migration in the media: Strategies, bias and blind-spots

Kjersti Thorbjørnsrud will hold this first seminar in the communicating migration series. It will be about media strategies that are used by different actors in the migration field. The main foci will be on the department of justice and police (JPD) and the Directorate of migration (UDI) where most of the fieldwork has been carried out. What do people working in these institutions do to avoid or limit negative talk about migration politics and bureaucratic processes on migration issues? How do they “sell” different cases to the media? Continue reading →